Up until yesterday afternoon, I did not realize that Igloo.com developed domain name assets on behalf of its clients. I was under the assumption that the company solely acted in a domain brokerage and consulting capacity. I just learned that Igloo.com launched a travel website on Turkey.com, on behalf of a client whose identity is private.
Visitors to the website can learn about the country, read about various tourist sites in the country, and can basically plan a trip to the country. As of right now, visitors cannot book a vacation or tours, but I would imagine that will change sometime in the future. The website is not currently monetized either, but I expect that will change in due time.
I reached out to Igloo.com to seek additional details not shared in the press release. According to Igloo.com’s Alphan Culha, “If you are going to stay in a country for a limited time, then the best source of information is Lonely Planet. However, if you really want to have the local experience, then you need to talk to the locals. Our idea with Turkey.com (and other Geo sites) is to have the locals to write about where they live. I wanted Turkey.com to be about the hidden gems of the country that only the locals know about.” Alphan is from Turkey, and he traveled to the country to set up the team that created and compiled all of the information shared on the website. This was a wise move because it’s the expert content that will help propel Turkey.com forward to gain traction.
According to Igloo.com co-founder and CEO Tessa Holcomb, the Turkey.com domain name was acquired by the company on behalf of its client approximately two years ago in a private transaction. Unfortunately, details of the acquisition cannot be disclosed due to a non-disclosure agreement.
Tessa was able to share more information about Igloo’s capabilities and offerings that I wasn’t aware of before learning about this project:
“Because Igloo primarily works with investors, VCs and Start-Ups on acquiring ultra-premium generic domains, there have been many requests over the years for additional services that we have slowly started to build in to our business model.
Some of these services include GTLD consulting, naming and branding, monetization, appraisals and development. Over the past year, several of these services have become a pretty substantial part of Igloo’s business.
While I wouldn’t say that development is necessarily a new channel for Igloo, we always try to add value to our clients, their names, and their businesses wherever and whenever we can so we are willing to review opportunities on a case by case basis to see if it’s a good fit. Just as we do with each domain name we decide to take on to sell or acquire, we need to make sure we’re on the same page as the client and are confident we’re the right team for the job before we take it on. Not every company is the best fit for every opportunity and I think it’s important that more people understand this before moving forward with any relationship.”
Homepage is way too spread out. From an affiliate marketing perspective you want call to action monetization opportunities on the homepage and there’s no room above the fold with current layout.
I do like the idea of having locals provide content. That will definitely offer a unique perspective.
Bet they get a lot of traffic looking for the butterball archives and live chat
Just too much going on to keep me on the site, load time is a bit slow as well. Good use rather than parking, owner should put some of those deep pockets into real development, and they have a money maker.
Pingdom gives the site a speed rating of 84/100: http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/#!/cQSsQQ/turkey.com
Speed could be improved I think, although I am not an expert in that area.
Unfortunately, it is still not what I call a “Hyperlocal” site that all geo domains should be.
When I think of hyperlocal , I think of sites like http://www.LymeLine.com , http://www.brentwoodhomepage.com http://www.ecoronado.com etc
I wish Turkey.com luck, but as it currently is, I think I could find most of the info on that site on Wikipedia.